102 HOMES WITHOUT HANDS. 



CHAPTER III. 



BURROWING REPTILES. 



The Reptiles and their Hibernation. — The Land Tortoise and its Winter Dwell- 

 ing.— rThe Crocodiles. — Snakes. — The Yellow Snake of Jamaica. — Its gen- 

 eral Habits. — Its burrowing powers discovered. — Presumed Method of removing 

 the Earth. 



The Reptiles are, as a body, not remarkable for the burrows 

 which they make. 



Many of them bore their way into the ground, pass a few 

 months in a state of torpidity, and then push their way out again. 

 But the hole which they make in the earth is scarcely to be called 

 a home, inasmuch as the inhabitant merely enters it as a conven- 

 ient place wherein it may become torpid, and abandons it as soon 

 as the ordinary functions of the system are restored by the 

 warmth of the succeeding year. 



The common Land Tortoise, for example (Testudo Grveca), is in 

 the habit of slowly digging a burrow with almost painful deliber- 

 ation, and then concealing itself below the surface of the earth 

 during the cold months of winter. Many Tortoises which have 

 lived in this country have been noticed to perform this act, and 

 I have lately seen a very good example of a burrow which had 

 been sunk amid some strawberry plants, and from which the in- 

 mate had just emerged. 



Many other reptiles follow a similar course of action. The 

 crocodiles, for example, burrow themselves deeply in the mud, 

 and have more than once caused much alarm by awakening out 

 of their hibernation, and protruding their unwelcome snouts from 

 the mud close to the feet of the astonished spectator. 



Snakes are accustomed, in like manner, to conceal themselves 

 during the period of their hibernation, resorting to hollow trees, 

 holes in the ground, and similar localities. Laborers, while en- 

 gaged in digging, especially in breaking down banks, frequently 

 unearth a goodly assemblage of snakes, all coiled up in an unsus- 

 pected cavity, which they must have entered through the desert- 

 ed burrow of a mouse or some other little animal. But that a 

 snake should be able to form its own burrow is a feature so re- 

 markable in herpetology, that a single accredited example must 

 not be passed without notice. 



